Most of the time, the taxidermist is always fixing the tanneries mesh up and they do not ever drop the price,no way. I use some great tanneries and I use up to 6 of them for not one of them are great on everything.One is great on international,one is great on thick skin game and so on. but boy do I hate them, sometimes, for they will screw up by over shaving-blow outs-,making holes,slippage, ripping hides in half, over mixing the “soup” , etc and then blaming it all on the animals health,prep time,taxidermist,etc but god forbid it they would blame themselves and drop the tanning rate or give it away for free. True, some problems are from that but a good taxidermist can always see problems before they are in the salt.If I mess up, I would be dropping my rate or giving it back to the client almost free. I had a tannery in CA. a few years ago mix the soup to strong and 8 bears had some part of there muzzles slip to some degree but it was not their fault and I was charged full price and that same season I shipped x amount of bears to another tannery and they all turned out great.So they will never get anymore bears from me but they do a great job on thinned skin capes-antelope,deer,etc. When choosing a tannery , it has a lot to do with trail and error,some have low prep time but no stretch,some have high prep time and great stretch ,some are just plain junk,etc.. Some tan their own items but for Capp’s, that is not an option.The studio has a lot of work and my completion time would go way down. When I choose a tannery they must have great stretch and low prep time,especially for Afrian game. I would like to see the taxidermy magazines do a exposé on grading all the tanneries ,A to F without any favoritism but I cannot see that for some do advertise with them. But it’s time the tanneries cowboy up.